OUR PROCESS
The Source
Springhill Freshwater Company(SFC) is uniquely situated in the Muskoka district in Huntsville, Ontario in the Canadian Shield. SFC provides the only true spring water from a source in Muskoka and the source is located right on site.
The aquifer from which SFC draws is part of a glacial deposit which was left as the glaciers receded to the north. This deposit consists of sand and gravel and is nestled amongst the rock formations to the south, east and west. To the north is clay. This basin of granular material is a natural filter for the aquifer from which the spring water is drawn.
Slightly to the south of the SFC facility is an artesian (continuously flowing) spring which has been flowing since 1932 when it was discovered by the builders of the present Brunel road.
It was that spring which is responsible for the creation of the present bottling operation. The old Brunel Spring was sold to SFC by the town of Huntsville who were the owners at the time, but were concerned about potential liability. That spring is now closed due to lack of agreement with another local government. It is owned by but not used by SFC.
SFC was very fortunate to access their new aquifer after being forced to scrap plans for using the old existing spring.
The source for SFC is unusual in that it contains no salt or fluoride and the slight amount of iron is removed by a simple process. The mineral content is quite low at 88 parts per million and is naturally occurring. Our water is described as tasting like water should taste... very pleasant.
Filtration Process
Filtration consists of a preliminary bag filter to remove any particulates such as sand particles. This is followed by an Ultraviolet light and then a final filter of .45 microns. To put this in perspective, the period at the end of this sentence is 600 microns.
The last step is ozonization. Ozone is created by an ozone generator. Quite simply, regular breathable air is drawn into the generator where it is given an electrical jolt to break the oxygen molecules apart from O2 to O3 (ozone). The ozone is pumped into the bottled product in the form of bubbles. While the ozone is in this form, it enacts a chemical reaction on any impurities that could be in the water. It actually converts any impurities into H2O as its by-product and then returns to it's original state of just O2 (oxygen), within 24 hours, with no side effects of taste or odor. This is the most natural filtration process available and does not have the negative aspects of using Reverse Osmosis, a process which uses salt as a filter.